“Hello test subject. Thank you for your participation in the Synthlabs long term augmented hominid storage testing program. The current year is ~error~. Scientists will catch you up on what has occurred since your storage in 1994.” Scrolls across a small blue screen floating in front of my face, and is narrated by a female robotic voice.

My back is against the floor, which seems to have very thin carpeting over it. The room I am in, is 2/3 meters tall, looks like a coffin, and seems to be wet, water dripping down the walls. The air is dry and shockingly cold.

Where the hell am I? Who is Synthlabs? Who am I?

Before I can answer these questions, I hear a grinding *Cuchunk* and then a low whirring. The room I'm in starts tilting forward, and the condensation on the ceiling runs down towards my feet. I can't see much, besides a scary black void through what apparently is glass. The room stops tilting forward, and light starts to seep through the glass. A series of red lights come on from the left, increasing in brightness until the one in front of me lights up, revealing a skeleton in another pod across the hallway.

With a quiet click the pod door opens, and I start to try to get up, and immediately fall down out, onto the grate floor. Underneath the floor it seems there are a bunch of pipes with ice glistening off them. I try to stand up, pushing myself up with my still weak arm. I stagger over to the other side of the hallway, slamming against the other pod, shivering from the biting cold. Looking down the hallway I can see something like 40 other pods all open, and a door at the other end of the hallway.

I start lumbering my way towards it, still leaning against the wall when I can until I reach the end of the hallway. On either side of the hallway are 2 normal wooden doors. Choosing arbitrarily I go into the left door, into a cramped office washed over by the dim red lights. There is a L shaped desk, with a computer on it, and strewn across the floor are hundreds of papers. There is a pipe running along the ceiling, with ice bursting out of it.

Maybe that computer will tell me something about this.

I walk over to the computer, and tap the spacebar expectantly. After several seconds, I hear the whirring of fans starting up, and the beep of a malfunctioning driver. The screen flashes to a logo for several seconds, and then signs in automatically. On the computer desktop the backdrop is proclaiming that the facility is undergoing “Unexpected problems'' and to report any unusual activity. On the desktop it has a bunch of files, with one of them labeled “Test subject roster”. I pull the chair over in front of the computer and then double click on the roster. A spreadsheet pulls up, with names of test subjects, their age, weight, previous job, and their current condition. The top 20 are listed as null, so I scroll down to see the rest. All the others are listed as null, except for the bottom one. The bottom person has their status set to dead. Looking one above it I discover my name is Mike Lingston.

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Mike Lingston. Does Not bring back any memories. Wait, how do I know what any of this stuff is anyway. Or how to walk?

According to this spreadsheet I'm 27, and have my job listed as field engineer.

Suddenly an alien thought intrudes my mind.

[Body heat at 90 degrees. Starting heat generator]

The hell was that!

I panicky start looking around, before seeing a small triangle of glowing orange on my wrist

What are you? I ask into my mind

[I am the jade artificial assistant, here to help with long term memory storage and thought processing]

Uhm … Hi? I'm Mike Lington.

[I am aware]

[Again, the external temperature is below safe hominid levels. I recommend finding insulating clothes, as I can only generate so much heat]

I quickly glance around the office looking for any clothing more substantial than the thin nylon jumpsuit I'm wearing, before sitting back down at the computer. I quickly check the time, which helpfully just asks me to set the current time. After quickly checking the desk drawers, I stumble over into the hallway, and then into the other room.

At the back of the room is a screen, and there are 2 rows of white plastic chairs sitting on the cold concrete floor. The screen is hooked up to a small computer on a cart, sitting in the corner of the room. On one of the chairs there is a white lab coat. I quickly walked over, going around the knocked over chairs, and grabbed the coat. I pulled the coat on, and walked around the chairs, over towards the cart. I quickly open the computer, and see a file labeled reintroduction videos. Quickly mousing over it, I'm greeted with a password lock.

Can you help with this . . . what do you want me to call you?

[My name is Jade, but you can call me anything else]

I'll stick with Jade for now. Can you hack the computer?

[I don't know how to do that]

Why not? You're a computer after all.

[I share the same abilities as you, so I don't know how to hack it open]

Oh. That makes sense I guess

Do you have any idea what year it is, or even what time it is?

[Do you?]

Fair.

I decide to get up, and after quickly looking around and finding a pack of moldy gum on the bottom shelf of the cart, I decide to head out of this … what would I even call this place? Cryohall? I'm going to stick with cryohall for now

So, I step over to the large pair of metal doors, and click the little button on the wall. After the light flickers, and one bursts, the doors open, revealing a dark hallway lit only by red emergency lights.

Here we go.